DALLAS FRASCA – SOUND PAINTER

Dallas Frasca doesn’t exactly fall into the category of girl next door. Her music is a barrage of big bold sounds in the same vein as Queens of the Stone Age or The Black Keys. With her fiery red dreadlocks and mean looks she’s a scary embodiment of rock’n’roll. So, she’s pretty much the antithesis of a female artist like Adele. Dallas Frasca’s second album Sound Painter is a rip-roaring rock’n’roll adventure featuring Frasca’s vocals belting over snapping John Bonham-esque drumming and Sabbath-inspired guitar riffage. To exemplify how balls to the wall rock this album is you can tune into the track Better Without You, or the last three minutes of which just features a hypnotic jam that ends in a hail of clanging snare and tom tom fills and crashing guitars. Going Back Row features a sinister hip-hop groove in the verses that interchange with big stadium rock choruses while Freedom is a simmering grooving blues number reminiscent of Bon Jovi’s Wanted Dead or Alive. This Melbournian doesn’t delve into subtlety too often on this record but if anyone ever tries to argue that rock’n’roll is dead just shove this album in their face.